Apple University – Jobs legacy to live on

BY THE APPLE GIRL

Apple has an uphill task ahead. A task to deliver products as Steve did and a task to think like Steve did. LATimes reports a heavily guarded project within the Apple campus. It is an executive training program called the Apple University to engrain Jobs’ DNA (not literally) in the company’s executives. In other words, Steve planned to keep the company rolling and to continue his Apple legacy.

It is said that Steve identified things that are responsible for Apple’s innovation and success – accountability, attention to detail, perfectionism, simplicity and secrecy. He oversaw the creation of courses that demonstrate how to translate those principles into business practices. Jobs’s previous company, Pixar also has a similar university model.

One of Apple’s employees said, “Steve was looking to his legacy. The idea was to take what is unique about Apple and create a forum that can impart that DNA to future generations of Apple employees,” said a former Apple executive who spoke on the condition of anonymity to preserve his relationship with the company. “No other company has a university charged with probing so deeply into the roots of what makes the company so successful.”

Jobs is said to have recruited the dean of Yale Business School to run it along with other business professors and Harvard veterans to prepare employees for Stevehood.